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OT: Computers VS The 29th - Humans win

One example of technology being stupid versus the intelligence of real people centers around Feb 29th.

Every 3 years out of 4, forum software delightfully neglects to inform the public that any todays are in fact my birthday. Their software may indicate today that "Tomorrow's birthdays: Cobalt Katze" -- However, once tomorrow rolls around, nothing of the sort will be reported. Perhaps for a fraction of a second in the crossover between 11:59 and Midnight, someone refreshing ever so insignificantly will chance to see a milisecond of a 29th day between the 28th and the 1st, but the chances are ever so slim.

Back in 1999, I wasn't worried at all about y2k. No no, the actual crossover into the new year didn't phase me at all. But there was rumor that whoever invented the concept of the 29th in the first place was going to declare there to not be a 29th in the year 2000. That struck me hard. Would I have to wait another 5 years to simply say "hey, today was the day I was born" -- or would they abolish the day all together? Would I then cease to exist? A paradox caught up in a system of numbers that decides certain people no longer were born on the days that they were? Thankfully, that's not the case.

So to all those worried about AI getting increasingly smarter, don't worry. Until machines can recognize my birthday, they ain't takin' anyone over.

As the song goes, another day older, and deeper in debt. Except I don't owe my soul to the company store. That would be pretty terrifying. I just owe it to Sally Mae and "Perkins", whoever the hell he is. Let's fix that eventually, shall we?

So for now, I'm in the last phase of being 5 leapyears old. Or, you could say 23. Just don't rely on technology to remember for you.

Re: OT: Computers VS The 29th - Humans win

My suggestion would be to tell the computers your birthday is either February 28th or March 1st. In reality, an extra day doesn’t exist. It’s just our way of coping with the Earth’s revolution around the sun not being an even multiple of the rotation. It’s kind of difficult to have a partial day in the calendar.

The only way for a computer to accurately cope with this would be to have a calendar that is not tied to celestial occurrences. If we were all lost in space, these ties could be easily broken. But back here on Earth, we would have to live with the change that 8 AM will be at a different “time” of day every day. A gradual shift to compensate for the roughly ¼ day extra in a year could be added. Or, we would have to say that when the Earth reaches the vernal Equinox, the New Year would start regardless of the “time of day” it is. So, the next day would be roughly six hours later in the “day”.